Germany’s renewable energy cooperatives

Throughout Germany, citizens’ cooperatives have developed renewable energy installations, taking a direct role in the country’s clean energy transition. One of the main benefits of community ownership models is that citizens can invest in local facilities where the cost for an individual might be too high. Such models can also include municipalities and companies as participants. A 2018 study found that citizens’ energy ownership amounted to 42% in 2016 (31.5% owned by private individuals and 10.5% by farmers). In that year, there were over 1 000 energy cooperatives across the country. While the shift in remuneration for renewables projects based on 2016 reforms to the auction system that favoured corporate investments, the reforms granted special privileges to citizens’ energy groups (though those were later suspended in 2018, due to misuse based on indistinct definitions). 

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